Date of Graduation
Fall 2015
Degree
Master of Arts in Religious Studies
Department
Religious Studies
Committee Chair
John Schmalzbauer
Abstract
Modern postural yoga is an amalgamation of practices that continues to defy traditional explanatory models that understand religious, spiritual, and secular to be mutually exclusive categories. In this project, I conduct in-depth interviews with yoga instructors in the Ozarks. In these interviews, I asked my informants to explain how they understand religious, spiritual, and secular. I then asked if and how they would use those words to describe yoga. These interviews revealed that religious, spiritual, and secular are not mutually exclusive, but are instead related, blended, and connected, especially when used to describe yoga. These findings inform my proposed explanatory model which reflects how my interviewees talk about yoga with respect to these categories.
Keywords
yoga, modern postural yoga, religious, spiritual, secular, bodies, practice
Subject Categories
Religion
Copyright
© Kimberley J. Pingatore
Recommended Citation
Pingatore, Kimberley J., "Bodies Bending Boundaries: Religious, Spiritual, and Secular Identities of Modern Postural Yoga in the Ozarks" (2015). MSU Graduate Theses. 3010.
https://bearworks.missouristate.edu/theses/3010
